Glasgow and District Wargaming Society

Display Games

NewsWelcome!To GDWS is the home of wargaming in Glasgow since 1969. This site tells you all about the society - what we do and when we meet. You can also browse through our extensive collection of display games that highlights the very best this fascinating hobby has to offer.

FoG CompetitionDraw, army lists, FAQs and more on the ancients page here.

AGM - 18 SeptemberThe GDWS AGM was held on Sunday 18 September. Next year's meeting schedule is available here. Members agreed to make better use of the Forum that would become the main method of communication, including when seeking games.

Claymore 16The Edinburgh wargame show, Claymore, was held at the Edinburgh College campus at Granton on 6 August. The GDWS participation game was Pancho Villa and the Gold Train.

Carronade 16The Falkirk wargame show was Carronade, on 7 May. The GDWS display game was 'Salonika 2016' in 28mm, using Bolt Action rules.

Scottish Battlefields TrustOur first display game of 2016 was at the Scottish Battlefields Trust Wargame Show at Prestonpans on Saturday 20 February 2016. We did Flodden 1513 in 10mm.

Featured Games

Lion RampantLion Rampant is published by Osprey and written by Daniel Mersey. They are a simple set of rules for the medieval period based around a retinue of typically around 50 models in six or so units of 6 or 12 figures, although you can do smaller and bigger actions. It's not quite skirmish, but it is part of trend towards smaller games that don't require a year's painting before you get a game on the table.

The activation sequence starts with Leaders issuing challenges, rallying battered units and testing for wild charges by your Knights. However, the key is ordered activations that require different dice throws to move, shoot or attack. This is very clever as it reflects a units willingness do undertake different actions. For example, knights are difficult to get moving but easy to charge. If you fail an activation, your turn ends, a bit like Black Powder. This means you need to decide which activations are most important to your battle plan and have lower dice requirements, so the risk of failing is lower.

The shooting and combat mechanisms are very straightforward, based on the ability of the unit and the armour class to survive hits. You remove models and that weakens the unit's impact once you reach half strength. Losing figures is even more important in the courage (morale) tests that you have to take after losing casualties, because they get deducted from the dice roll.​The game is usually played to a number of scenarios, but you can make your own up. These are typically small action scenarios around raiding, convoys and collecting taxes.

Dystopian WarsImagine a world similar to our own, but subtly different. Now imagine the year is 1870 and the Industrial Revolution occurred decades earlier than in our own world. Technology is far advanced, and in many cases, unrecognisable, which has led to the development of fantastic naval vessels, hulking land ships and terror from the skies in the form of airships and war balloons.

The Dystopian Wars game is set in a Victorian Steampunk world and we have designed the rules to ensure a fun game with a large selection of high quality models in a couple of hours. The rules support Naval, Aerial and Land models from the outset, so that you can set up battles and scenarios in any combat setting.